Look, Cut the Shit: Ryan Gosling’s “La La Land” Character is Not a White Savior

At the Academy Awards this Sunday (Feb. 26th), La La Land will go to head-to-head with a handful of other movies for a number of awards. Will it win Best Picture? Will Emma Stone win Best Actress? Will Ryan Gosling be the cutest.. err… win Best Actor? Possibly “yes” to all three of those questions.

But, whether La La Land cleans up or not — and it probably will, because the Oscars rarely get anything right — there is one theory about the film we should toss out. And it’s a theory that keeps popping up, ostensibly to discredit it. It’s this theory that Ryan Gosling’s character in La La Land is a white savior. I hate to break it you, but well, he’s just… not.

He may think he’s trying to save jazz, keep jazz pure, keep jazz as it was intended to be — but the reality is Ryan Gosling’s character in La La Land is a fucking loser. Because only losers like jazz.

That was a joke.

No, but seriously, I’d posit an alternative theory, that La La Land’s real jazz savior is not the white guy, but the black guy — John Legend. He is the one who throws Gosling a bone, asks the unemployed pianist to play in his band, gives him an opportunity to make money — money he needs for his club — where previously there was none. In fact, it’s hard to think of…